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Originally Posted by ninja91
Well, as far as I know, leeches would have been used to drain the blood from her broken arm. So I dont think an archaic meaning was intended.
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Leeches, as pointed out above, were primarily used to bleed patients, but not to relieve internal pressures. They were used to correct imbalances of the humours, which are entirely mythical complaints. Nobody would have thought of using a leech on Eowyn's broken arm.
Tolkien uses 'leech' and 'leechcraft' to mean 'physician' and 'medical practice' respectively at a number of points in LotR, notably in Theoden's words to Grima on casting him out of Edoras. As I mentioned above, the words for the parasitic swamp-dwelling invertebrate and a doctor were once completely separate, but merged before the modern English period. Tolkien's use of the older term is probably a reflection of his preference for 'real' English words: those which had derived from Old English. 'Doctor' and 'medicine' are borrowed terms.
To the best of my knowledge, the verb 'to leech' doesn't refer to doctors at all.
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Originally Posted by dictionary.com
leech (1) /litʃ/
–noun
1. any bloodsucking or carnivorous aquatic or terrestrial worm of the class Hirudinea, certain freshwater species of which were formerly much used in medicine for bloodletting.
2. a person who clings to another for personal gain, esp. without giving anything in return, and usually with the implication or effect of exhausting the other's resources; parasite.
3. Archaic. an instrument used for drawing blood.
–verb (used with object)
4. to apply leeches to, so as to bleed.
5. to cling to and feed upon or drain, as a leech: His relatives leeched him until his entire fortune was exhausted.
6. Archaic. to cure; heal.
–verb (used without object)
7. to hang on to a person in the manner of a leech: She leeched on to him for dear life.
[Origin: bef. 900; ME leche, OE læce; r. (by confusion with leech (2)) ME liche, OE lȳce; c. MD lieke; akin to OE lūcan to pull out, MHG liechen to pull]
—Related forms
leechlike, adjective
—Synonyms: bloodsucker; extortioner; sponger.
leech2 /litʃ/
–noun Archaic.
a physician.
[Origin: bef. 1150; ME leche, OE læce; c. OS lāki, OHG lāhhi, Goth lēkeis; akin to ON læknir]
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